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Following recent revelations about serious flaws in the Tier 4 (student) immigration system a former civil servant in the UK's Home Office has also questioned the reliability of the UK's immigration statistics.
On Tuesday 24th June, the UK's immigration minister, James Brokenshire, delivered a statement to the House of Commons about abuse of the system for testing the English of applicants for Tier 4 student visas.
By Alex Owen
On Monday 30th June 2014, after waiting for more than a year for Congress to pass an immigration reform bill, President Obama finally admitted that reform legislation is unlikely to be passed by both Houses of Congress. In a speech from the Rose Garden in the White House, he said that his administration will now take steps to reform the US's immigration system without the support of Congress.
UK immigration staff are expected to strike on July 10th. They will join members of several other trades unions in the public sector in staging a day of action.
On 1st July, the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS), which represents immigration service staff and other civil servants, announced that it will ask its members to join the strike which will involve teachers, civil servants and local government workers.
If the strike goes ahead, it is likely that immigration staff in UK ports and airports may join the action and this will almost certainly cause disruption for air, rail and sea passengers.
Citizenship and Immigration Canada have issued new guidance for staff processing applications for work permits for Intra Company Transferees with 'specialized knowledge'.
The new guidelines introduce tougher requirements to come in as a 'specialized knowledge' worker. In some cases there will also be a minimum wage requirement.
The new definition has been introduced as part of Canada's Economic Action Plan 2014. It is one of several changes which the government says will ensure that entry of temporary foreign workers (including intra company transferees) into Canada do not disadvantage Canadian workers.
Future Conservative Party parliamentary candidates want to see overseas students removed from the UK's migration statistics, according to a newly released poll. The poll, conducted by the Higher Education Policy Institute, an Oxford-based think tank, also revealed that the Tory candidates would like to see the number of international students at UK universities increase.
The Higher Education Policy Institute, which is based in Oxford, conducted a small survey among prospective parliamentary Conservative candidates for the next general election which will be held in May 2015.
The UK's Office for National Statistics has released its latest mid-year population estimate which suggests that the UK population exceeded 64 million for the first time in mid-2013.